Batman: the Chronicle of the Cowl
by FosterStinson
Summary: When a mysterious new villain calling himself the Arkham Knight forms a group of former C-List criminals, Batman meets an unexpected end, forcing Dick to take up the mantle at one of the worst times in his life, just as an enraged Joker declares war on the Arkham Knights. DISCLAIMER: I do not own the characters of DC Comics. Fair warning, the Arkham Knight will not be Jason Todd.
1. The Night the Batman Died

"How much longer until all the data's been transferred, Kuttler?" asked the impatient Arkham Knight.

"Two minutes. Probably less if you'd quit asking that." Responded the Calculator. Arkham Knight decided not to respond, wanting to speed up the process. He was still waiting on the guest of honor to arrive.

 _Whoosh_

"Right on time." He said, turning towards the sound. "Batman, it's been too long- who the hell are you?"

"Your worst nightmare." Said Batwoman, immediately firing at the Arkham Knight, but the bullets just bounced off of his armor. Calculator, however, instantly ducked down, but Firefly stepped in front of him and blasted at Batwoman, but she dodged and Arkham Knight put his arm in front of him.

"Not yet, Firefly." He said, scanning the area.

"Why wait? Let's just burn the place! We don't need Batman for that!" urged Anarky, and Firefly huffed in agreement. Arkham Knight ignored them.

"Zebra-Man, Copperhead, find this 'Batwoman' and kill her. Kuttler, finish transferring the data." He ordered.

"Yes sir." He said, returning to his work as Zebra-Man and Copperhead left to follow out their orders. From far up above sat the Batman, scanning the scene. He counted eight villains, seven of which he had fought before but had never considered much trouble, the Calculator, Firefly, Killer Moth, Zebra-Man, Anarky, the Electrocutioner, and the new female Copperhead. They were being led by a man Batman had never seen in person before, but there had recently been several reports about the "Arkham Knight".

"So what's the play?" asked Batwoman, suddenly appearing next to him.

"The play is you get out of here and leave this to me." He said, not at all startled.

"Yeah right, you need me and you know it."

He grimaced. "Fine. You help me take them down now, then you and I need to have a discussion."

Without another word, she was gone and he sighed, jumping down from the beam and kicking Killer Moth in the head.

"Ah! Batman! I've been waiting too long for this." said the Knight.

"Do we know each other?" he asked.

"In a way. I wouldn't expect you to remember."

"And people say I'm cryptic."

"Ha! Here I was thinking you didn't have a sense of humor." He joked, lunging at Batman, but he jumped back, barely dodging the punch.

"All data transferred!" shouted Calculator.

"Good! Moth, get Calculator out of here!" ordered the Knight, and Moth grabbed Calculator, flying out of one of the holes in the ceiling. "Firefly! Anarky! Light it up!"

"Now we're talkin'!" screamed Firefly as he flew up and began burning the whole place, but Batwoman shot him in the head. Luckily, his helmet deflected the bullet, but it still phased him. He turned to her and blasted, but she dodged and continued shooting.

Copperhead ran behind Batman and slashed him in the back of the neck and he backed away from the Knight, grasping his neck, screaming in pain.

"Batman!" screamed Batwoman.

"I'm fine!" he screamed back, but the Knight punched him in the face, knocking him to his knees, and he kicked him in the stomach. Zebra-Man came running and controlled one of the rods holding the place together to rip out of place and hit Batman, causing the warehouse to begin crumbling. Zebra-Man then forced a bit of the ground to rip out and form a platform and he levitated towards Copperhead, picking her up, and they then floated towards Anarky, who had just finished settling in his final bomb. He was a bit reluctant to get on, but Zebra-Man forced the metal on his costume towards them. Lastly they floated to Electrocutioner, who was zapping Batwoman. She collapsed to her knees and he hopped on. Zebra-Man looked at Arkham Knight, but he was too busy wailing on Batman to notice, so he lifted the platform up and they followed after Moth.

The Knight threw another punch, which Batman caught and he kicked the Knight in the stomach, but he yanked Batman forward, throwing him into a wooden box that he caught fire. His cape lit on fire, which quickly would have reached his costume, but he ripped off the cape and turned towards the Knight, getting ready to throw another punch, but he was caught off guard by the Knight lunging a knife directly into his chest. Batman coughed out blood and look directly at the Knight, who opened his helmet to show Batman his true face. They both stood there in silence, but Firefly flew down and said "We gotta get out of here! The place is gonna blow!"

Reluctantly, he removed the knife from Batman's chest, allowing him to fall to the ground and let Firefly carry him out. As soon as they were gone, Batwoman ran over to Batman and helped him up.

"We're gonna get you out of here." She promised. It wasn't very hard to get up to the nearest exit due to Batman's sheer will to survive, but as soon as Batwoman opened the door, Batman looked back and saw the explosives were close to zero. He looked down to see the large amount of blood pouring from his chest, and he made an impulsive decision to shove Batwoman out the door, sending her falling into the river by the warehouse. He clutched his chest and stumbled back into the railing.

"I always thought it would be the Joker." He said as the bombs all hit zero, blowing the warehouse to smithereens.


	2. Lost and Found

"God, it's freezing." Said Commissioner Gordon to himself as he stood next to the Bat-Signal, trying to use it to warm himself up. He'd been up on that rooftop for thirty minutes. He's waited an hour once, and Batman showed up just before he went back down that time, so he wasn't willing to give up. But this was the third time he hasn't showed up all week. He reached for a cigarette, but remembered he threw his pack away after he promised Barbara he'd quit. "God dammit, where the hell are you?" he asked the city skyline. Soon enough, he pulled out his phone and was dialing Barbara.

"Hey dad! What's up?" she asked.

"Hey, I'm up on the rooftop for the third time this week, and he's not here. Have you spoken to him lately?" he asked.

"Oddly enough, no. It's been almost two weeks of complete radio silence. I'll look into it and get back to you. But for tonight, don't freeze to death, go back inside, okay?"

"Okay, sweetie."

"I love you, dad."

"I love you, too." He said, hanging up. He took one last look at the city before shutting off the signal and heading inside. Back in her apartment, Barbara stared off into space wondering, _Where the hell are you, Bruce?_ Soon enough she was on her way to the Manor.

Once she arrived, she wheeled herself into the dining room to find Alfred sitting at the head of the table, with a bottle of scotch in his hand. It looked like he hadn't changed clothes or showered in a few days.

"Alfred?" she asked cautiously.

"Ms. Gordon!" he said, hiccupping, getting out of his seat. "May I ask what brings you here?"

"I'm looking for Bruce."

"Yes, well, I'm afraid you're not the only one."

She looked away, not knowing what to say. "Have you called anyone?" she asked.

"No. He's been away longer than this before." He insisted.

"That doesn't mean anything Alfred. We need to find him." She urged. He sighed, but he knew she was right. Before either of them could say anything, Barbara got an alert on her phone. She pulled it out and saw that Mayor Hamilton Hill was holding a press conference about Batman's disappearance.

"Hill is such an idiot. Now he's just going to get the criminal underworld excited, Alfred we _need_ to call someone."

"You're right. I'll call Master Dick momentarily." She looked away once more. She hadn't talked to Dick in a while, and she wished the circumstances could be a little better. She left before Alfred could call Dick, she wanted to check on her dad.

Meanwhile, Dick was at his on-again off-again girlfriend, Koriand'r's apartment, in the middle of a very important argument.

"Dick! If you don't think it's a good idea for me to get bangs I want you to just come right out and tell me!" she said, getting angry.

"I literally just said you should do what you want, Kori, what is the big deal?" he said very chalantly.

"It's the principle of the thing! You're treating my decision like it has no ramifications! If you can't take me seriously-"

"Whoa, when did this turn into an actual argument?"

"When it began!"

"You actually think I don't take you seriously?!"

Before she could respond, his phone started ringing.

"No, go ahead. Answer it." She urged. Reluctantly he pulled it out and saw it was Alfred, so he picked up.

"You have amazing timing, Alfred."

"We have an emergency." He said.

"What's new?"

"Master Bruce is missing."

Dick sighed. "God dammit. I'll be right there." He hung up and grabbed his jacket. "Kori, I have to go." He leaned in to kiss her on the cheek, but she turned away. He wanted to stay and work this out with her, but he knew that it was probably a bad idea, so he left. He sped all the way from Bludhaven to Gotham in under an hour and made it to the Manor fairly quickly. He went inside and went immediately down to the Cave, where he found Alfred sitting at the computer, watching the news.

"Alfred?" he asked. Alfred turned to face him and shut off the news. He stood. "Hello Master Dick."

"I've told you a million times Alfred, you can just call me Dick." He took his jacket off and hung it over a balance beam. "How long has he been gone?"

"Two weeks, three days, and sixteen hours." He said plainly.

"He's been gone longer before." He said.

"But he's never gone this long without contacting me in some way."

"Maybe he sent you a signal and you missed it."

"No. Something is wrong. I'm sure of it."

Dick could hear the worry in Alfred's voice, so he sighed and walked to him, offering him a chair, which he took. He walked over to the cases holding the costumes and looked into the Batman rack, holding Bruce's original costume.

"What was his last known location?" he asked.

"A warehouse by the docks, owned by Wayne Enterprises. It blew up."

"Do you know who else was there?"

"A mysterious vigilante calling herself the Batwoman made an appearance."

"Hm. I'll look into that later, what about enemies?"

"He counted eight before initiating radio silence."

"I'll check the place out." He said, preparing to go get in costume, but he was stopped by a third party entering the Cave.

"Someone tell me where my father is _now_."

"Damian. Good to see you." Said Dick, deadpan.

"All these rumors of him disappearing must have been fabricated, I know my father better than this. Where is he?" he said, storming all through the Cave.

"That's what we're trying to figure out, Damian. Aren't you supposed to be in Tibet?" asked Dick.

"My training there was near complete. I left as soon as I saw Hill's press conference. How do you intend to find him?" he asked, as if he was testing Dick.

"I was about to go check out his last known location." He said, waiting for it.

"I'm coming with you."

"Trust me, I already knew that. But you can't wear that." He said, motioning to the Tibetan Monk garb. "Suit up, let's go."

"Suit up?" asked a confused Damian.

"Oh yeah… um, just throw on a Robin costume. Tim probably won't care." Suggested Dick.

Damian briefly stopped his eyes from widening in joy, and retorted "As if I care what Drake thinks."

As soon as they both got suited up, they headed to the warehouse.

"Wow, this is not a pretty site." Said Nightwing, in awe of the rubble that has been left behind in the explosion.

"What are we even going to find here? My father obviously isn't in there." Insisted Damian.

"Just come on… there's gotta be something we can use." He said, beginning to wade through all the ash. They searched the entire compound for about half an hour until Dick saw a limp hand sticking out from a pile of debris.

"Oh god…" he muttered before cautiously walking over. He began shoving off the large pieces of debris, eventually getting to the bottom of the pile. What he found made his entire world freeze. There he was, standing and staring down at the Batman's corpse. "Damian." He said, his voice cracking. Damian barely heard him and came running over. When he saw it, his face went completely emotionless. Dick could tell he was holding everything back, and he didn't blame him. With tears in his eyes, he picked up the body and walked it back to the Batmobile, he and Damian not saying another word the entire ride back the Mansion.


End file.
